Acceptance
by bookaddict04
Summary: Severus Snape before he becomes a professor at Hogwarts.


**This is my first fanfic ever. I'm super nervous. Hope you like it. Enjoy!**

* * *

It was a dreary July night when Severus Snape emerged from the hidden staircase behind the stone gargoyle. His black cloak billowed out as he strode through the Entrance Hall, towards the moonlit lake. It had been barely a week, but being back in Hogwarts; the first and only place he considered home, had instantly improved his sour mood. Though the students hadn't cared for him (rather, despised him) he still loved Hogwarts-the only place which had accepted him for who he was. It was where he had found his passion for potions, it was where he got a break from his constantly quarreling parents. It was where he found peace; even if it was in the dark, smoky, potions classroom, or in the Slytherin dungeons, or at the lake shore adjoining the Forbidden Forest.

As he neared the still lake, a pair of lucid eyes, shone through the dark, paralyzing him for a second. Severus flicked his wand out, prepared, but before he could move, a silver tabby appeared. The cat looked straight at his eye, unblinking, and Severus mirrored her. It was a challenge. They stared at each other, for what seemed to be eternity. Finally Snape blinked, accepting his defeat. With an elegant and decisive move, the cat sat on her haunches, looking majestic, as she began to lick her paws. Tentatively, Severus lowered his wand, tucking it back into his black cloak.

She continued licking her paws, as he stood still, watching her. A few minutes passed before he moved. With one last glance at her, he continued his walk to the lake shore. At the edge of the Forbidden Forest adjoining the lake, stood out a shining, ink black rock. It was he would come when he needed to read letters from home, when he needed a place away from Hogwarts, away from Potter and his gang, away… Reaching the rock, he proceeded to climb the slippery wet surface. As he reached the top, something blurry to his left, caught his eye. It was the cat. She had decided to follow him, it seemed. Agilely, she sprung onto the perilously wet surface and using her sharp, gleaming claws, latched herself onto it. With one last leap, she was beside him.

A beam of moonlight shone onto Severus and the poised cat. Silence pervaded.

"You aren't magical are you?" whispered Snape, afraid to break the silence.

She didn't answer. Continuing to lick herself clean with keen interest, she completely ignored him. Taking this to be a no, he continued,

"I don't know. I don't know what to do. Do I do what he suggests and take the job offer? Do they really want me? Would they want me as a professor? There's nothing else for me to do, nowhere else to go…He promised me. He promised me that if I did what he asked, she would be safe. She would be alive." It wasn't a rant. It was whispers; it was words filled with sorrow, carrying weight, his face impassive, devoid of any emotions. The cat had had paused licking, while his whisperings, and instead had cocked an ear towards him; listening with the utmost attention.

All of a sudden, as if remembering something, he turned around, feeling the rock with his long, nimble fingers. Within a few seconds, his fingers came across a small but precise inscription. It had been his third year at Hogwarts, on a night similar to the present one, when he had inscribed it. Wandless. It was very few things that Severus did, without the use of a wand, but when it came to his favorite, muggleborn witch, magic was set aside. The inscription read:

LILY EVANS

It was not perfectly chiseled, but it had taken him hours of careful, concentrated chiseling. Even then, Severus had known that it wouldn't be Lily Snape. It would never be. A silvery tear escaped the masked, discreet, deep eyes of Severus Snape.

"Gone. Forever." His whisper, nearly non-existent, was carried away by the wind, but not before the keen ears of the cat caught it. She silently padded to him, rubbing her soft, silky fur against him. Severus _nearly_ relaxed. It felt almost good to say everything aloud. To share his weighted plagued thoughts to someone (even if she was a cat). "When did it all go wrong?" As if the cat, or anybody, could answer his question. "When I was born. They never wanted me, my parents". The last word was said with so much venom and anger, that the cat shivered a little with fright.

"Hogwarts didn't want me, none of the Slytherins, not even the professors. Lily was the only one who cared, but I lost her too, lost her to the throng of students who hated me. And then, he came. The Dark Lord. He wanted me, he accepted me. Even Dumbledore didn't, only a tool. Only a tool, to be discarded once used," It was the cold, yet fiery words, coming from a whirlpool of emotions that startled the avidly listening cat.

Just like his sudden outburst, Severus simmered down. The world had crippled him inside. All that was left was a crushed heart and a destroyed soul. A cold, indifferent cloak of demeanor had taken possession. Nothing was left for Severus Snape, an abused, wounded, and mocked man.

Having made his mind, he rose. With a flick from his wand, Severus descended and disappeared into the Forbidden Forest. And for the first time that night, the tabby remained where she was. She vaulted from the rock, as if a gymnast, and landed gracefully. With a quick shake, she padded to the castle's Entrance Hall door. Just before she entered, in a fraction of a second, her small shadow transformed into a long one. A woman in a rippling coat and a witch hat entered Hogwarts.


End file.
